Chris Threadgill has made a rather successful transition from racing on two wheels to racing on four. Today he brings us his race report from Brands Hatch a few weeks ago.
Saturday Qualifying: I managed to get out onto the track second in the queue behind Harry Mangion, but after two laps decided to get past and up the pace as I didn’t think we were circulating quick enough for a strong grid position.
As it is only a 15 minutes qualifying session, there isn’t much time to be hanging around! I put in several good laps in a row, and was sitting on provisional pole for most of the session. I started to develop a cloud of smoke coming from under the bonnet on the left hand side, which was filling the cockpit of the car and also covering my tyres in oil.
I drove around this and kept pushing on regardless. Two laps from the end I made a mistake into turn two when I was -0.5 seconds up on my fastest lap and I had to bail out of the lap. Unfortunately this was the fastest lap of the session and I got pushed from pole position back down to third on the grid.
The problem turned out to be a faulty oil catch-tank which was overflowing and sending oil everywhere so very lucky not to have been black-flagged from the session or to have spun out on my own oil!
Race 1 – starting from P3 on the grid I got a good start and held my position for the first lap. Rounding the final corner of lap one, the top four were side-by-side heading 2-by-2 down the finish straight. Leaving it as late as I dared, I outbraked the two cars in front heading into Paddock Hill bend to take the lead.
Following a short safety car period, I pulled the pin and build my lead up to nearly two seconds and then just managed the gap for the last few laps to ensure I brought the car home for my first win of the season.
Race 2 – starting from Pole I got another great start and lead the race for the first six laps, pulling away to a 1.7 second lead. I ran wide out of Sheene Curve two laps from then end, ending up on the grass and dropping down to P2 with a one second gap to the leader. Digging deep on the remaining two laps I managed to pull right back onto the rear of Harry Mangion heading into the final corner.
I opted to go around the outside as I knew I was faster through Clearways, using the extra speed to pull alongside down the finish straight. It was a photo-finish, which ended up with myself being P2, but only 0.04 seconds from the win!
So in summary, a fantastic end to my rookie season of car racing! One win, one fastest lap, five podiums and seven top 10 finishes is a dream! I ended up third overall in the championship and the only privateer inside the top 10!
We now focus on setting up a Wildcard entry into the next level of the Ginetta racing ladder, the G40 Cup, which returns to action at Donington Park on 14/15 September as part of the British GT paddock.
Images courtesy of Jakub Ebrey
